Russell feared P10 start after issues hampered Chinese Grand Prix qualifying

George Russell feared he would be starting the Chinese Grand Prix from 10th place after a trouble-hit end to qualifying left him with just one lap to secure a front row spot.

Mercedes has been the dominant car so far this season but there have been spells of reliability concerns at the start of the new regulation era, with Russell suffering multiple issues in Shanghai. After winning the Sprint, the end of Q2 saw the championship leader abort his final attempt due to a front wing issue, before he stopped on track in Q3 and only emerged with two minutes remaining to qualify second to teammate Kimi Antonelli.

“It was a crazy session,” Russell said. “From the end of Q2, the front wing broke and the team weren’t sure if it had broken or not. I was pretty convinced it had and there was a bit of stress around that and changing the front wing.

“Then as soon as I went out on the track, I could tell something wasn’t right, stopping on the track, trying to restart the car. It didn’t restart, then it started later, got back in, couldn’t shift gears, and then we made it on track with seconds to spare. So really, really happy to be sat here right now because I could easily have been down in P10 without a time on the board.”

Russell says the rushed end to the session also meant his car was far from ready to start his final attempt, so he was particularly proud of the lap that saw him end up just over 0.2s off Antonelli.

“It was as good as I could have achieved, but I had no battery starting my lap and my tires were cold,” he said. “But as I said, I’m very grateful to be sat here right now. It was more a case of getting a time on the board. I knew Kimi’s been really strong and things were far from optimized my side, so it was more a case of get the car across the line and make sure I’m starting in a sensible position.

“P2 was much better than I expected. When I started the lap with no battery and no tire temperature, I was expecting to be further down the order. So just really glad to be here.”

After fighting with a Ferrari at the start of each race so far this year, Russell says he expects another challenge when the lights go out on Sunday.

“It has been great opening few laps for the last two races. We know Ferrari are quick off the line and we’ve got them in P3 and P4, which is the first time of the season, and Lewis [Hamilton] was obviously great at the beginning of the race this morning, so I am sure it’s not going to be straightforward.”